September ... why isn't it Nontember?

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

Croissants, coffee and quadriceps.

This morning I was sufficiently civilised to have a long Sunday lie-in and not head off for my scheduled run until the outrageous late hour of 11 a.m. This was almost enough to put me in a state of shock but proved to be merely psychosomatic and a quick once-over indicated the body seemed up for it, so off I went.

The day was cool, but not cold, with only the very lightest of misty drizzles which was as nothing compared to the buckets of sweat my flabby self was producing, and so of no consequence. It was, you might say, pretty much ideal running weather.

Of course one of the drawbacks of running in such an urbane setting as Sunday morning in a sophisticated, old-money suburb such as ours is that one does have to run past those very dégagé cafés that make you almost cry with their roasted single origin coffee and organic smoked free-range organic bacon aromas and the easy, comfortable attitude of their non-running customers who, if they perchance happen to make eye contact with you as you run past, have nought but pity for your obvious, blatant and shameless show of insanity. I did, I have to say, feel like an intruder on their Notting Hill-style petit déjeuner du dimanche*.

The run itself was a pretty bad one. Perhaps that wasn’t totally unexpected after two brilliant runs to begin the current campaign, so I’m not exactly upset about it, even if I didn’t quite cover the distance I had intended. Pain in my left knee was a touch uncomfortable, but I didn’t mind that so much as this is normal when starting over again as I am, and pain in my right quads was merely an indicator that I haven’t been stretching and massaging the big muscles appropriately, so OK, lesson learned, thank you and I will attend to that. The vice-like grip of lethargy that overcame my legs and lungs as I attempted to push on toward my intended goal was sufficient to make me turn around on the spot and head for home home, not unhappy exactly, but at least a little melancholy. Maybe this will be harder than I thought after all.

But then, nothing worthwhile is ever easy, so I know I’m on the right track; as if there was ever any doubt. This all feels so familiar, like a home coming and that outweighs the negatives of a painful run cut short. There's a long way to go to wherever it is I'm going, but the journey will of course be worthwhile. I may want to stop running past cafés on Sunday mornings, though.


*Breakfast, for non-Notting Hill types.